Nightmare
by Crazyone911
Summary: A story of a girl who has trouble falling asleep. She sees horrible things because of it. Then this girl fall into a nightmare. An dark alternative take on Alice in wonderland.
1. I'm awake

_Part One_

_Insomnia _

_I'm not asleep... but that doesn't mean I'm awake. ~Author Unknown_

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_

_Well hello hello._

_This bastardized version of the wonderful Lewis Caroll story ALICE IN WONDERLAND was meant to explore an idea that I had digging into my skull like a persistent little tumor! _

_To let all know its intended to be dark. But I manage to put in some oh so clever statements throughout the story just ruin my oh soo angst mood._

_Hopefully you snicker to yourself at the break of the melodramatic intensity._

_Or not. _

_Ah well._

_Any who I set this in more modern times and is a story about a girl who goes to sleep._

_Yes it is a master plot, No?_

_Not really._

_That's all I can share without spoiling some majorly spoilable events. You know such things have short shelf lives. _

_I can still continue on my rant though. Need to up that word count to ze MAX._

_Well, for all those dedicated readers that I just ruined the tone of the whole story by reading this silliness will be rewarded. There shall be weird ass Hatter romance. We all love weird ass romance because it rhymes. _

_Hmm_

_Well enjoy. _

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_Sleep... Oh! how I loathe those little slices of death. ~Author unknown, various wordings commonly attributed to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Edgar Allan Poe, and __Journey to the Center of the Earth_

Walked home from school today.

Again.

Yes, I walked three miles home.

What was the reason for me to spend the better part of an hour , walking with books weighing more then they should? I fell asleep during last period. My peers didn't find it necessary to wake me up and until the teacher poke me with a shaky finger asking whether or not I wanted a aspirin.

I jumped waking up from a dream in which I was getting stabbed by a knife. Not very pleasant.

Though this isn't new.

In fact it's a routine by now. I would maybe get a few hours of sleep for a couple of days . Wake up depending if I even slept. Rushed to school. Fought to stay awake, only stayed up through the day because of the things in the corner. Couldn't stay up during last period and maybe I would catch the bus. And every time I dream, I dream of scary things.

So I can't fall asleep.

Because the things I see when I sleep are far worst then the Thing in the corner.

Perhaps this is the reason things aren't going quite right.

He he he he ha HA HA HAHA.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if all my problems could be solved by getting a little more sleep.

It would be a wonderland.

By the way, its not like I hate walking or any cardiovascular exercise. It's just that I wasn't in the mood. You have to be in the mood for those kinds of things.

So I walked home, tired as crap. I haven't slept too much for the past five days. I felt like I was dying. Every step was cumbersome.

"Cumbersome" I said out loud, enjoying the taste of the word. I said it again and again till the word evolved into cucumber. Then I stopped, feeling stupid.

"It's no use trying to act smart." I said sternly to myself. "Your just making it worst for yourself, You are."

I welled up with tears and refused to let them go. "Stop it." I replied.

I played this until I got home. Speaking sternly and sobbing alternatively. It distracted me from my exhaustion.

I liked playing these games.

Sometimes the other me was quite entertaining . Occasional I got to talk to an English little boy, other times it was a Russian rocker. Most of the time I got stuck with someone who was quite frankly a ass. Like today.

I walked into a small house in a shabby neighborhood. It was the only "real" neighborhood in town. So naturally it invited the attention of the towns population during the major Holidays. Carolers during Christmas , Trick or treaters during Halloween, and a perpetual supply of those people who try to get you to convert.

I let my Backpack (or Mochila as I learned in Spanish today) fall heavily on the floor, releasing the pain from my back. Rubbing my sore spots I walked into the kitchen. Which wasn't much of one. Half the house was made up of a large square that contained the living room, kitchen and dining room. The only distinction between these areas was the change from carpet to tile.

I opened the brown fridge and sighed. God the fridge was made in the seventies I swear. Who made _brown_ fridges? It was such an ugly bleh brown too. The upside to it was that it matched the horrible paint drip walls. I suppose this all was very attractive thirty years ago. Well back to the pressing dilemma of eating.

Tortillas, cheese, apple sauce, pineapple, walnuts, and ketchup was the entire contents if the fridge.

Like yesterday.

So like yesterday I made myself a quesadilla with everything in the fridge, using the ketchup and applesauce as dipping sauce.

Creative, No?

I had to eat.

So I wasn't picky.

Then I did my homework for entertainment. I have no T.V or computer, or any other modern convince such as a Mp3 or a cell phone or whatever. Nope had to find things to do other then glue myself to a screen.

I read quite a bit. In fact, much more then my peers in my Hick town. I get tease because of it. I don't care though. Nope, I absolutely don't give a rat's ass. I just don't read at school anymore.

But today I decided to go for a walk on the account of how flippin woozy I was.

First I took a tour of my house.

I noticed some pictures of my younger years scatter about the house. I was a fat little thing. My little jelly rolls were fleshy like grub fat. Oh yes, I was an obese child because my mom would let her sweet baby anything she desired to eat. So I was a little greedy guts. It wasn't till I was older did I gain some self control and thinned out. Ah, I was an funny looking kid.

I also took into account that my cat was missing. She usually liked to greet me, rubbing her damn hair all over my body. Inducing me to a fit of sneezing. I don't know why I even kept a cat when I'm allergic to them.

Well the funny thing about that is, I found her in a dumpster. To be exact it was the dumpster in front of the house that gave my abode so much charm. I was out for one of my walks when I heard this really pathetic mewling. It was the kind of pathetic that you knew that the originator of the sound knew that it was dying. So it was making this mewling so that whoever heard it will know that it existed. I heard it and I was hella curious. So I went sorting through shining bags of trash and sludge that smelt like baking shit. Then I found this little mangy ash kitten being smashed by a can of soda that was leaking all over her. She had a gimp leg because of it. Her foot pointed up all the time.

I saved her.

She didn't seem to be very grateful though. The way she likes to pounce on my head in the middle of the bloody night. I don't get very mad about it though. I'm usually wide awake about midnight. She helps me get through the long nights. She likes to play this one game where she attacks my hand vehemently until she knocks herself out. It pretty funny to watch.

I couldn't find her in the house

Ah well. She was most likely in one of those hiding places that wouldn't cross my to look.

Laying about in a contented way.

As cats like to do.

I walked about my neighborhood. Enjoying the freedom from the Thing, The only time I didn't see it was when I was outside. No corners for It to reside in. Nope. The walk perked me up. Such freedom from stress, soreness, exhaustion, and the Thing was a rarity. I even smiled to myself and began to hum some made up nonsense.

Perhaps I could be a wild child. Go off and live without corners in the wilderness.

Sleep whenever I wanted. Eat berries and leaves. Piss on trees to mark my territory. Kill a Bambi with my bear hands, letting the warm gushing blood wash over me like a baptism.

I chuckled.

Though as the world would have it, I stopped. As the world would have it, it preferred me miserable. I stared bugged eyed at the saturnine object before me.

Dilah.

It couldn't be. How the hell did she even get out?

Oh my Dilah.

I stumbled over to the bloody smashed bit of fur.

It was. Itwasitwasitwasitwasitwas.

A car ran over her head. The bones splintered through the skin, letting the brain to spill out and deflate her pretty round face. It stretched her gums back revealing all her white pointy teeth. Dilah smiled at me morbidly. Already the kittens body was hard and bloated from the decomposing gas from her insides.

I nudged her with the tip of my shoe.

Should I bury her or leave her prone? I stared at the ugly thing at my feet. The ashen fur blended wonderfully into the road. Dilahs blood had outline her head in a dark contrast. Like the day I found her. Covered in sickly sweet syrup.

Poor helpless thing. I didn't save her after all.

I had to bury her.

Swallowing my disgust I grabbed Dilahs body and felt it deflate. It smelt like rotting death.

Choking down rising bile I ran to my backyard. Kicking a shallow grave I threw the kitten into it. I covered the grave with a mountain of dirt and rocks.

I threw up over the fence once I noticed the bits of brain covering my shirt.

I washed my hands over and over again. I scrubbed myself in the shower till my skin was raw. I threw my clothes into the dumpster.

Into Dilah's dumpster.

I sat on my couch. My eyes too tired to cry. It all seem to be a haze. It really did. As soon as I touched her carcass my brain went into this alternate state where I was watching everything from outside my body. Or at least imagine how I looked from my body. I don't think I experienced an astro whatever the hell. I did feel this separation like feeling. Like the connection between my mind and body was snapped. I sat there till it was dark. Till I know mother would be home soon.

Finally I went to my bedroom. The thing in the corner was waiting. The thing is a constant ……..constant presence in my life. It would sit in the corner, always shifting wretchedly . It had no eyes but it knew when ever I closed my eyes for too long. It would creep closer to me. It had large jagged knife teeth. Its skin sometimes would be translucent and I could see its insides. Other times it's skin was like black velvet and I couldn't see it at all in the dark. But it's indentations would shine as if it had eyes. It was so horrendously thin that its starved bones stuck out.

It was frightening.

And I saw it everyday.

And my head was still filled with images of Dilah's broken body..

But Oh. Oh Oh OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHH.

The smaller the room the closer the thing. The closer that monster was.

The snuffling rasping razing breath keeping my senses screaming.

It was nothing, though.

Compared to those dreams.

To those god damn dreams.

I stared at the thing as I climbed into bed. It was twitching in an sharp unnatural way. The Thing warped it's body into this impossible positions, that should have broken something in any normal creature. This was how it was for a great while. At one point I heard mom come home from work. She slowly opened the door and peered in on me. I was rolled on my side away from her.

"Your such a good girl." she cooed to herself. "Good girl."

Mom went away shutting the door oh so carefully. Like she was afraid if she made too much noise she would wake me up. Oh that just murdered me when she did that. I lied there staring at the corner. She said that sometimes, but most of the time she would just look at me for minutes on end. This was the only time she would ever say something to me during a period of twenty-four hours.

Though occasionally my body betrays me. My stone heavy eyelids would close for a moment and the thing was closer and louder. Hours passed and my eyes strained to see where that thing was. Minutes ticked away and my body shut down. I couldn't take it anymore. My eyes fell heavily shut. Then what hell happened for moments. Thousands of the things eating me alive. My guts were spread around me like some macabre holiday celebration. Blood was pooling around me. So much scarlet water came from me that I was drowning in it. But for some reason I was desperately trying to gather my organs back inside me but those Things. They were eating them and I was dying and dying.


	2. Reality

Hello!

My goodness, I would like to thank the first wonderful reviewer, since they reviewed anonymously I couldn't send them a private message. I really hope everyone can detect the sarcasm in my first authors note.

Anywho, it will take one more chapter till we get to something resembling wonderland my dear readers so don't expect immediate gratification of jumping into wonderland in chapter uno. Also I divided the whole shibang into three parts.

Part one- Insomnia

Basically an intro

Part two- Sleep

Adventures in a dark wonderland

Part three- waking

Ending

There we are. Planned out the whole story. Of course its more detailed and such but I cant just give away the whole story in the second authors note.

This story is intended to be dark and I will put some light points in it so its not too depressing.

By the way, every name in this story is intentional. Some of them are puns and acronyms. You will not see it right away but as the story continues you will.

Enjoy.

Oh yes my beta reader is AWeSoMe.

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"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one."Albert Einstein

BEEEP BEEEP BEEEP BEEP BEEEP.

The alarm.

Saved me, woke me up.

Only giving me twenty three hours of control before I lose it.

The dream was never the same. Never ever did it provide a routine other then that it will happen.

How I hate it.

And again I start my day, wishing it would never end. But it always did.

I suppose I should tell you of my heritage and parents and my younger years. I wont though, I consider it properly boring. I give you just enough so you wont be irked about the lack of reason for some of my actions. Like with Dilah,

I'm the only child as far as I'm aware of. My father could have had more but I have no means of communicating with him. My mother and I are what you can call a family. A two-person, mother- daughter enterprise. She had me when she was only a little older then I am right now and dropped out of school. She isn't a bad person though. She is in fact the most kind considerate human being that I know. She never swears.

And my insomnia is only a recent occurrence of the last six months.

Being alone most of the time makes me really really attached to things that I am around, my pair of shoes, my baby blanket, a cat.

Call it loyalty or call it a attachment disorder. Either way its all the same.

This morning I woke up to another ass face me.

"Get cha bones up pathetic. Its another day of fun filled humiliation." I chided myself.

"Stuff it" I replied.

"Your not the boss of me!"

"Unfortunately, I am"

"Well I'm not the one who fell asleep, eh. I wasn't the one who couldn't control myself" my other self snarled.

I snorted as I made my way to the bathroom for my morning rituals. Brushed my short hair. Long hair makes me fill a little ill when I see it. When it falls out you have these long thin bits of you floating about. In your food and on the walls of the bathtub. Sometimes I find long pieces of hair on my jacket that do not belong to me. It disgusts me. Mom has long hair, it's the pretty kind though because it rarely falls out.

Brushed my teeth, splash my face with cold water so I can trick my body to think its refreshed. I did this all rather quickly because the Thing was so close I could feel its breath.

I threw some clothes on and tripped out to the corner where the bus came to pick my lonely ass up. As usual the dogs at the corner house began their insistent barking. I tried to ignore the pack of Chihuahua and the lone Rottweiler as they flipped their lids. Those dogs are rather popular with the mostly Hispanic town I live in. Heck I'm related to half of them (the population of the town not the dogs). That's what happens after a generation or two of a newcomer bloodline coming to this town. You marry one Martinez and related to the Medinas and Lopez as well.

So almost everyone at school was my cousin.

But I retained a lot of my moms whiteness. It kills me really. All the white kids , which isn't much, are baffled when all the gangster G's are relatively chill with me. In fact my cousins think it's really hilarious when I throw up a made up gang sign and start spouting off stereotypical gangster lingo. That's how white looking I am. Granted a white person who is a shade darker then most, but still rather white and nerdy.

I sat there trying to ignore those damn dogs. There was a dark stain in the middle of the road in front of me. I tried to ignore that also. This was little squiggles of grey matter in the stain. I looked away.

To divert myself I started to talk to the asshole of the day.

"Your such a ugly thing, why don't you put more effort into personal grooming."

"I take a shower everyday."

"True, at least you don't stink, but you look like you do."

"Too tired to care"

"Satan would run pissing himself if he saw your face."

"Isn't that supposed to be good?"

"Not when he is pissing himself with terror."

"Ha Ha your such comedian"

"Ha Ha your such a ass kisser."

My other self began to snicker.

"Everyone HATES you" She continued

I was silent.

"Your so annoying. The only reason they tolerate you is because they feel sorry."

I rolled my eyes. That was something I could believe. They always seemed so false around me, around each other. They were fake everywhere. Fake fake fake. Sometimes I was even fake to get through the day.

"Most of the time." The other corrected.

I grunted in reply.

"You know if they weren't fake they would be such animals. So I suppose its rather good to be superficial."

I thought about times when they were still fake and acted like animals. Chicas fighting with a girls that her boyfriend cheated on her with.

"Thats when they are still acting 'civilized'. Imagine a human without any restraints. The toy of civilization thrown out the window."

I shook my head.

"Hmmmmm your still such little beasts with your fakeness though. Killing each other for no reason by the hundreds. Always looking for some terrorists, communists, or heretics to kill to satisfy your blood lust or fear or whatever."

I tried to leave my mind blank so that my other self will go away. She didn't.

"Depends what you prefer. The all natural version or your justified version"

"GO away" I growled. Usually the others aren't so flipping chatty about philosophy. They are not very smart. But this reasoning of my other self was frightening. I usually could predict what they would say , but this one was thinking for herself. She chuckled and did not speak.

The dogs were still barking by the time the bus came.

I observed my peers milling about the bus. I wondered what it would be like to be them. Not to be so tired or frightened all the time. Thankfully a seat was open so I didn't have to sit by a stranger for an awkward thirty minutes. I was watching this couple who were making out right in front of me. I know its pretty creepy for me to be watching them dry humping but it always fascinated me when people didn't care what others thought. These two kids were unfake at the moment. They were so real. They started to get really nasty and I had a suspicion that the guy was fingering the girl judging from her moans.

Jesus, they didn't give a flip who was watching. An eight year old boy was watching them too. He had a great view of the action going on. I on the other hand had a seat blocking my view. Damn I must be some kind of perv. I didn't care really though. The couple finished up ten minutes later. I watched every second of it.

I spent the rest of the trip watching other people like a creeper, wondering what it was like to be them. I carefully avoided looking at the Thing that was sprawled out at the back of the bus. The girl for example must be very satisfied right now. Though I would've been all worried about whether he washed his hands. If he didn't, did whack off recently? Did he still have junk all over his hands? Would the girl get pregnant? I wouldn't want to get pregnant on some bus with a creepy weird girl and some eight year old boy watching me conceive a child. Maybe that's how I started. On a bus with an audience. I wonder if I could find somebody to go ask. Did ma enjoy it? Did she scream? Did she shudder? Or did she just sit there and take it?

My ponderings were interrupted as we stopped in front of the dump of a school. Did you know that La Luz high got the third highest academic and college preparatory school in the whole state? Yes, some jackass in the federal district thought it would be funny. I thought it was riot when they announced on the intercom.. How the principals voice just fluttered with pleasure as she cooed "third best school in the state". It reminded me of the sounds the girl on the bus was making.

It really annoyed me on how she made such a big deal about it. As if it really matter.

The principal was an old white lady so she thought that the award to the school was all her doing. I can only imagine her jowls quivering with joy when she received the news. Singled handedly she turned around a school that never met AYP……oh how marvelous.

I pursed my lips as I stumbled to first period.

I sat through class watching the stupid Thing in the corner. It was the only way I was able to stay up threw most of the day. The Thing was so terrifying that I couldn't fall asleep. I waited to get called down to the consolers office. It's the only reason I bother going to school anymore. Have you noticed that. You go to school and you god damn hate that fucking school. Everything about it is a lie.

Do you learn? Not really.

Is it safe? Nope.

Will you use concepts that will apply to real life situations? Hell no.

Don't get me started on the social aspect of school. Lets say if you're a little odd, people avoid you. It's as if the whole system is in place to make you hate to learn. To ask questions. To be your self. It squashes you like a bug.

Sometimes you'll get that teacher. You know. The one that makes it a little more bearable. The class you don't want to miss. I used to have one of those teachers freshmen year, but he got fired. He was rapist.

Finally by the end of third period I got called down. Miss Leon wasn't the greatest of counselors. I always thought that she thought everything I said was absolute shit. The way she rolled her eyes, blowing that tuff of graying hair out of face right in a middle of some secret. It annoyed the crap out of me. But everything I said to her was confidential expect the whole "If your thinking about hurting yourself or someone else I have to tell for your safety" bit. It was good to talk to someone who was suppose to listen.

She started off the way I always hated as I settled myself on the saggy couch.

"How are you feeling about your sister?" she creaked like a door.

"I don't have a sister….not anymore." I replied. She died of fucking cancer.

"Why do you feel that way?" she said that stupid standard psychology crap. I didn't even mention anything about feelings. It was a fact, not some emotional filled opinion.

I sighed out some stupid cookie cutter crap. " I feel sad."

Fuck. I watched my four year old sister slowly die. For two years I watched her deteriorate with Mom. We could do nothing about it too. Absolutely fucking nothing because of the god damn limited monetary funds in the bank account.

I heard in Canada and the U.K they have _free_ Health care. That all you have to do is walk into a hospital and they took care of you with no charge. They save your baby sister instead of turning her away. Instead of letting her family watch as she grew gaunt and skinny like the Thing. Instead of you watching her hack up blood and all you can give her is a aspirin and some cough syrup.

I was sleeping in the garage, freezing my ass off when it finally happened. Just because I couldn't be in the same room as a dying baby. The bastard child of one of mom's clients. Oh she was pretty though. She had the kind of hair that you would be off walking through a field and you see something shining in the corner of your eye and there she was , staring at you. She had sky blue eyes. There were so much brighter then my own blue-mistaken -for-brown eyes. I was envious of her sometimes. She was sweet and soft as a teacake. Always wanting to help, to please, to be kind. She could be a brat when she wanted though. So busy tearing open everything with curiosity, making one huge mess. Then she died from some hereditary cancer she got from her never-was-there dad.

God, I'm just a puddle of Angst. No not a puddle, a freaking swimming pool of wallowing depression. I need a new day job.

I sniffed dryly as the consular wrote this down on her notepad. She continued on with the standard conversation we always went over.

"Are you sleeping well?"

"Ya."

"No more nightmares?"

"Yep."

" Taking the medicine?"

"Yes"

"Doing well in school?"

I smiled at that. It was the most easy thing to do is to get decent grades. Just do the busy work and be there. Although there was those times when the teacher didn't teach anything and gave you a quiz and what they supposedly taught. That was a pain.

"Yepperdoodles"

"Gud gud" she muttered. I really like when she let her accent bleed through her speech. I could never guess what kind it was.

She wrote a few more things down and sent me off. By this time I was really exhausted. I had to act bright and perky around Miss Leon or otherwise she would know I was lying. It was tiresome to be what your not.

I inserted myself back into class glad for break of the tremendous bore of the school day. (He he, the word _inserted_ always cracks me up. Excuse my penis humor.) I resumed staring at the thing as the teacher went on about trigometery. I like math. I like all school subjects actually. It's just when you get a teacher who cant teach in a way you can understand, that subject becomes the least favorite thing to do that day. Like right now, I could grasp what she talking about but when quiz time comes around I fail horribly. I just don't understand. Somehow I felt that this related to a juxtaposition.

Oh that was such a wonderful word. Perhaps the juxtaposition is when I'm looking at a forty three percent test score and I remember being so confident when I took the test.

I said the word to my self quietly.

There was this real bourgeois boy that was rather handsome in my math class. He had this really define features like he was chiseled out of some olive marble by a master sculptor who wanted to sculpt an angel, but messed up and produced this beautiful boy. Yes he was that gorgeous enough to be an attempted angel. I'm not kidding about the well honed features of his either. Most people I know have these soft round blah faces, his face was very sharp looking. Nothing was round, only harsh lines. Now that I think about, that's most likely the reason he was an rejected angel. I always thought of angels who had supple malleable features.

The funny thing about him though is that he had this poof of cinnamon wool on his head. If he let his hair grow out it would stand on end and form an amazing white boy afro. He looked a lot like Bob Dylan.

He sat a desk diagonally away from me that put his face at this certain aspect that caught just enough light from his brow to cast his eyes in shadow. This made look like he didn't have any eyes. Which is certainly interesting and added to his allure. I also get to stare at the back of his head all the time with my insides withering about. And all this staring gets me really depressed because I start to think bout this one time during freshmen year when I could've been his friend.

I usually always end up in this situation where I happen to be with a really attractive boy and all is going well. Except because I'm naive or scatterbrained at the time I bungle up perfectly good chances to get with these boys. Either I say something stupid or I don't pursue them or something small like that and I mess myself up. Years later I brood over this situations in my head coming up with alternate actions I could've done.

I'll keep it short about what happen because its kinda dreary. I was in the lunch line and the handsome boy is next to me. I ask him who he is because I didn't and I know most of the populace of La Luz high because I'm related to them and such. He said his name was Edward Darnings. He moved from Chicago because his parents liked the view. HA HA. What a riot.

That all we have here. A view of the Sangre de Cristo mountains, that turn pink during the sunset.

I could tell he wasn't very happy about it. His parents must be old because old people tend to like to look at things and move because of how things look in certain areas. He also looked like a type a kind with old parents. He was rich for one thing judging from his well to do possessions and rich people tend to wait and have the perfect circumstances to have a baby and crap. That doesn't come along till ten years into their marriage after being engage for five or something like that.

Well one thing led to another and we had a decent conversation except I ruined it unknowingly. My earring had fallen out earlier that day and I thought that Edward would be just a gentleman and put back in for me in the line. He was queasy about it and I insisted. And insisted and finally I had to put the damn thing in myself because he didn't like piercings. We didn't talk after that.

I'm sure he remembers me as the weird piercing girl.

Ack.

I do attract creepy boys like crazy. You know those really awkward boys who stand next to you smiling nervous barely containing themselves. Then they latch onto you for half a year. They don't contribute much to a conversation but they do like to stare. I'm very bad at confrontation so I just ignore, run, and hide from these boys till they leave me alone. I'm such an asshole for doing that.

Like right now I have this boy name Tom.

At first he was a great kid and all, we got along fine. Then I guess he thought I loved him or something because I was nice. Boys always think that. So he got all awkward and creepy.

I bet your thinking that I attract creepers because I'm rather creepy my self. Well your right about me being rather creepy now, but your wrong about the attraction of awkward boys as some sort of karma. I wasn't always so odd. But I have always enticed this kind of creepy boy attention ever since my peers hit the wonderful age of puberty.

Soon it was time for lunch. Lunch was a great joke. The worst food was served there because you _had _to eat it. You couldn't really complain because what the hell could you do? Speak to the manager? Demand your money back? Nope. The principal couldn't do anything because it was a governmental thing and the lunch was free.

Bring your own damn lunch.

I couldn't though. Not too much in the fridge back home. The lines were great too. Either you haul ass to be first, which is never my case because I'm always too tired to do any hauling of asses, or you can wait till the lines are gone. Then you have only the least appetizing food remaining.

I usually end up right in the middle. It takes forever. But that's okay. I usually have no one to sit with during lunch. It's the most pathetic thing ever. To sit by yourself when your related to half the school. Sometimes though. I get lucky and I find someone who has room and wants my weird ass commentary.

Have you ever done that. Get so nervous that you begin to throw up words that are sometimes funny. I do that all the time. I've notice that the more dirty it is the funnier it sometimes comes out. Most of the time I say the wrong things though.

Today, I was sick of waiting. Sick of the people who took cuts and I'm to out there to cut with someone I know and not feel unwanted. Sick of wondering around with a tray not really touching my food. I don't know what spurred me to be so sick but I left the lunch line and went to the nurse.

I asked for an aspirin. The nurse gave me one with a condom. I always get a kick out of that. On one of my less socially inept days I was dared to go to the nurse's office and ask how to use a flavored condom. There was laughs all around as I wondered in and innocently asked the question.

I could be a good actor when I want to. Actually I'm not a good actor at all when I think about it. It took all of my control not to crack up when I asked her about the condoms. So I'm an average actor. No better then your average person, which is good. I'm tired of being out of the loop of average-ness.

The nurse gave me this look and gave me all of these regular condoms and a fact sheet. She was so pissed . The reason was that she was a catholic and it was state law or something that she gives out condoms when the student body asked for them. I bet she loathes thinking about all the premarital sex she's gives out. She a really nice lady though. She even tries to forget that I asked for condoms. Real sweet of her to forgive me for my heathen ways. She always makes sure that I have a condom though. It makes me chuckle when she hands me one with her look. It was a pleading look for my soul.

It also kills me the way she smokes like a chimney. Found out the day she gave all the freshmen classes the spill about how smoking was bad. I decided to walk home that day on the account of how nice it was when I noticed her off in a corner puffing away at a cancer stick like some depraved woman. I felt fundamentally lied to that day. She was still a nice lady though. Despite all her smoking and condoms.

I always keep the condoms though. Put them in my mom's jar of condoms for when she goes to work.

I walked out and about the school for a bit. I was toying with the idea of actually taking the aspirin. I always get so unreadily sleepy when I take one. But I felt actually really sick. I couldn't identify where it hurt. I just felt that there was something wrong with me.

Just as the bell rung I decided that I felt bad enough that I should take it. I stopped though when I raised it up to my mouth. Was I really so weak to need some pill to control how I felt. To be manipulated not by myself but some chemicals. Was I really so out of control with my body that I needed some aspirin? I threw the pill down the hall. It was crushed by the mob of students.

I could handle it.

It wasn't so bad. It was good when I was uncomfortable. I stayed up longer.

I grinned wildly to myself as to prove my enthusiasm.

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Constructive Critism everyone, if you feel that you have any.


	3. Horrid horrid life

Okay Chapter 3 Ladies and gentlemen

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_When you have insomnia, you're never really asleep, and you're never really awake. ~From the movie __Fight Club_, based on the novel by Chuck Palahniuk

I suppose it is much more comfortable to be mad and know it, than to be sane

and have one's doubts. ~G.B. Burgin

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I went on through the rest of the day entirely pleased that I was awake right to the end of it. No nodding off or anything. I left entirely on time and did not miss the bus. Granted I felt horrible, but very satisfied. I usually fell asleep for at least of few minutes at school. Waking up all trembling and sweaty. Not Today. I didn't even have an altercation at all with myself during the school day either.

Altercation. What an unusual word. Ha I was even using more difficult words today also.

I have to admit. The bus ride to and from school was one of my favorite parts of the day. It was not required for you to talk to anyone and you could stare out the window or at other people without anyone giving much of a damn. The couple from earlier today were missing but the boy was still there. He was such a funny looking thing. His hair was so wild and he had buck teeth. His ears stuck out like a mouse's would. What an awkward kid.

I tripped out of the bus and avoided the dark spot on the road. Flies were still hovering about it.

"Hiya Alice" a duo of troublemakers chimed. I smiled wearily and turned to the neighbor boys.

They were two ruddy brothers. They looked so similar that they could have been twins. Cherry complexions with broad squashed dollop noses and thin wire lips. They were both pudgy and doughy like bloated puppies. They had a baffling talent of finishing one another sentences and absolutely hated it when they did.

It was rumored that the youngest of the boys was the milk mans son. I didn't believe it , they were so god damn mirror images of each other that they had so have the most similar genetics that non identical twins could have. I did have tender spot for the youngest though.

"Ello Dennis. Ello Donald." I replied. I loathed it when parents named twins rhyming or matching names. As if they didn't have enough of an identity crisis, their parents give them basically the same name.

"We saw your dead cat yesterday." Donald ,the youngest, started cheerfully. He began to dance around his brother who joined him.

"Ya, we poked her with a stick until we heard something pop. I was thinking it was a bonesy . Sorry bout that by da way." Dennis continued. They were milling about so much with their constant fidgeting that I had to look at their sleeves that had either a stitched DEE or DON to keep track of them.

"Oh" I said quietly.

"Ya she was there yesterday." Donald pointed to the dark spot. "We were gonna put her in a box and give her to ya" He said slightly mournfully. "Have a proper funeral and all."

"She looked really happy to be dead. She had this huge curling smile. Never saw a cat smile before dat." Dennis added thoughtfully

"It was…" Donald began

"Yucky" Dennis finished in a excited rush.

They both paused and glared at each other

"Yucky" Donald said pompously looking away from Dennis.

Dennis returned with a look like he was so uncouthly insulted that he pursed his lips in a most amusing way.

"I know" I sighed. God, they meant well but they always chose the most inappropriate and uncomfortable things to talk to me about. Like on Monday they wanted to know more about mom. So I limited my interaction with them. They smelt like overpowering sausage too.

They both began to nod very seriously. They waited a moment to see whether or not I would respond like a girl their age. Which namely included squealing and then chasing me around with something disgusting. I nodded sagely along with them.

Once upon a time I would shriek and let them chase me with a dead bug or something. We would go to the field out behind the houses where all the sage grew wild and uncontrollable and find little clubhouses hidden in the brush. Sometimes I would bring Violet after it rained and we would breathe in the crisp moist earth and followed the doubled rainbows. Playing with younger children was so innocent and simple.

Oh but I grew up. Or something, I'm not sure anymore. I suppose that's what happens when you lose your innocence, your sanity.

The Brothers grew bored and wondered off. Only Donald decided to wave his goodbye. I snorted to myself when I noticed that his mother spelled DUM instead of DON on his sleeve.

Or is my eye sight spoiling?

I waved back and returned to my dreary day and went home.

The front yard was a mass of rocks. Its one of those low maintained yards because rocks don't need to be watered. However through out the years weeds have struggled through into the light. So a bunch of wispy weeds poked out of the rocks like some old man going bald. It was such an ugly yard. Mom liked it though.

I walked about the house for some time not knowing what to do. I was tired tired tired. Like I always was at this time of day. For a moment I started to look for Dilah, but I stopped. Then I remembered that I was rather hungry.

I chuckled.

Forgetting to feed myself? My, my I am going to kill myself if I didn't start to eat properly. Food recently was pushed to the very back of my mind and I would forget to eat for three days sometimes. Wasn't very healthy. I would get even more exhausted and more prone to fall asleep. So I tried to eat at least twice a day.

I looked in the fridge and only found some cheese. So I ate that. I couldn't notice how it tasted, which annoyed me. I used to love food, but now I was hardly able to taste it. All I felt was a solid mass in my mouth. Oh I wish mom will go shopping for some food soon. Otherwise I might forget until I was starving . Having groceries always reminded to eat. In fact I started to draw pictures of food and hang them up in my room so I wouldn't forget. It's been working, but if I don't have any food I feel a little sad.

I smiled to myself.

I checked the phone to see if mom called or anything. She didn't. So I went to her sparse room and found the jar. It was getting rather low. I didn't know whether to take this as good or bad. However I noticed something peculiar. The jar was on top of a journal. I was so tempted to look through it. People were so real when they wrote down thing that they know no one else will look at. I could see what mom really was. It was the kind of inviting journal too. Leather bound, soft to the touch, and weathered, enticing with so many stories and unknown reticent knowledge.

Finally it was too much.

I opened it and it was strange. All it had was appointments , names, Dates , and genders. I started to read some of them.

It first began as

Dec. 20th 1990

Harry six weeks male

Dr. Waorth

May 1st 1991

Henry two weeks male?

Dr. Waorth

October 12th 1991 

Lorina four weeks female

Dr. waorth

May 4th 1992 

Alice female still alive

Dr. Young

June 3rd 1994 

Edith five weeks female

Dr. Waorth

January 11th 1996

Rhonda seven weeks female?

Dr. Woarth

March 5th 1999

Eric ten weeks Male

Dr. worth

April 25th 2000

Lionel five weeks Male?

Dr. Waorth

September 11th 2004 

Violet four years Female

Dr. Young

At first I read this with an detached curiosity. Once I caught sight of my name I read faster and faster. Wolfing the words down, wishing for more of an explanation.

What is this? what is this? I asked my self with growing panic. What is this? what is this?

I know what this is. I don't want to.

Oh oh oh ooooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

I threw the book down. Why why whhhhhhhhyyyyyyyyy?

I picked it up again. Not believing what I saw I read it again and again. I stood there reading that damn book until I had every date and name memorized. Only two pages were filled. The rest of it was blank. Though if mother counted every monthly cycle I'm sure it would be full. I got the feeling that she did count though. She just let them pass into ominously into the blank pages.

That's why so much was empty.

That's why.

I replaced the book.

The thing crept near the journal. I stared stonily at it, daring it to go closer. I dared and dared. It didn't but I was so angry at it's gall for even wondering near that I yelled and screamed.

I cried the worst things I could at it and jumped and kicked. I threw a right little tantrum. I was so seething with venom that every pore was leaking poison. It raged against my insides that I thought that I was physically going to break. That I would explode. I wanted to destroy something so badly that it hurt me. I turned to the wall and kicked and punched it squealing hoarsely. Holes appeared and I felt better.

I collapsed.

I was such a coward.

I was so spent that I couldn't even cry.

After years I got up and wandered aimlessly. Everything was so surreal.

Nothing in the house felt right anymore. It was if I was in a strangers house. None of it belonged to me.

"They would have died anyway " My other self whispered. This time it was a child.

" Don't say that." I murmured " Don't ever say that"

"Mama has no money, we would've all starved." The little one said.

"No no no."

" It's true, she was merciful."

"She could've given you away. You could've lived."

"We didn't come nicely"

I didn't speak.

"Mama's job is dangerous."

"Why?" I moaned miserably.

I had no answer.

No flipping answer.

I sat on the couch running over the names.

Harry

Henry

Lorina

Edith

Rhonda

Eric

Lionel

Violet

Mom certainly loved old timey names. Names that you would find in a cemetery that was a hundred years old. The grave stones would be crumbling away to dust, the names barely legible, and all nearly forgotten. Those were the names she picked. I wondered whether or not I was suppose to live. Was mom so lonesome that she decided to have me? What about the others? I didn't know.

This got me to wonder about Violet. Was she intentional? Or did she creep along in moms womb unnoticed till it was too late.? Out of me and Violet I think little Violet was the most planned. I mean mom was still so young when she had me. Was I the little uninvited parasite that barrowed into the soft rich velvety lining of moms insides, living off of her like some worm? Was I some terminal disease growing like a tumor Barely noticeable till it was too late?

I murmured something unintelligible to myself as a confirmation. If this was true then it was too late. I'm practically out of the nest by now. Only a year more.

I thought about the names again..

Thinking and thinking. That's all I had time for now a days. All this time to think drove me up the wall. I mean I think I'm going insane. I pretty sure the Thing wasn't always there or at least I didn't see it all the time. I'm absolutely positive I didn't have nightmares for all of my life because I do remember the soft dusty good dreams.

And I know that all this sleep deprivation is unhealthy. Really unhealthy. The kind of unhealthy that your body starts to rot and so does your mind. I breathed deeply so I wouldn't think so much. I empty it of all the garbage in the corners as much as I could.

Ugh .

There was an sour acidic aroma in the air that smelt like throw up. Did it always smell like that? How horrible that I just realized what an awful smelling house I lived in. I was glad that no one ever came to our house.

I sat there, smelling how nasty my house smelt till I it faded out my conscious of how ghastly it all was.

I reclined on the couch only letting my mind wander to trivial things. I need to clean my room. The dishes need washing. Should I start on my final for English? I need to finish that drawing in art.

I thought about these insignificant details of my life without any intention of doing any of it. So I thought about what I should be doing just for the effect that I would think less deep thoughts. I felt very blah.

I got bored out of my mind. In the end I guess I would rather be miserable then nothing at all.

Maybe I'm not insane. That's it. I'm just overly imaginative. My life is just needs some touch ups from my mind to be more bearable, that's all. I'm perfectly fine.

I'm fine I'm fine I'm fine

I made a tune to these words. Chanting them till they weren't words at all, just noise without any meaning.

Boy, did I convince myself.

I sat there till my ass was sore and I knew it was time to go to my room. As per usual I walked around the house checking to make sure I wasn't burning anything or anything was unlocked. I did this three or four times just to make sure that everything was okay. After all this I still had a nag, so I checked a few more times. I didn't want to go to my room. The place where I sleep.

It was unavoidable though. I had to be in there before mom come home or she will know. So I went to my dump of a room. I never really cleaned it or anything because I felt it a waste of time. I never wanted to be in there. I pulled on a this baby blue shapeless t shirt. It was a sleep shirt so it was several sizes too large. Then I put on some comfy bum pants.

I sometimes like to look at my body in the mirror when I'm naked. Not in a perverted way that I'm sure your thinking of. No, I like to look at it because its just so unusual. The human body, I was in awe of it. The muscles under the expanse of skin, how they move so fluidly and beautifully. Our ability to walk on two legs. The skin that protects our insides so well. The fleshy bit of fat at our hips and chest. Why?

I thought it was elegant and pulchritudinous.

Oh my goodness. Did I just use that word? Holy crap what an amazingly long word. It sounds like some medical text about AIDS or something. But it isn't a word for some disease. It's a word for the human body. Pulchritudinous.

Tonight I didn't look at my body because it had grown to haggard to look at. I wasn't soft and shapely any more but rough and pointy. I didn't care to look at it anymore.

I did look at my face though. Faces were so captivating. Always changing and morphing into emotions that you could read. I twisted it to the sides to catch all the angles of my face. I scrunched it and contorted making funny faces at myself. I flared my nostrils of my small square nose. In fact my face was also rather square like. especially when I cock my head a certain way and smirk I look rather like some kind of devious…..something. Something like a weasel or a fox or something. That's only rarely though, most of the time I look like some kind of surprised chipmunk thing. That's only the beginning though. I wiggled my uneven eyebrows. I kills me. One side of my face seemed to have less hair then the other. The left side of my face had less eyebrows and eyelashes then the other. I thought it made look as if I'm always quirking my eyebrow in surprise. Luckily I don't think anyone notices though.

My lips seem to be my only redeeming feature. Ya know when people say things about cupids bows and the similarity with lips and such. Well you can say that for me, only its kind of crooked. Like cupid was kinda drunk when he made his bow that resemble my lips.

I grinned an uneven smile to myself before turning to bed.

I settled myself into bed and watched the thing for a long time. I just stared at it until my eyes hurt. To save my eyes I would glance at the alarm clock from time to time. I hate to do this though. It just makes the hours seem to drag on forever. Which they did. My eyes were beginning to be disloyal once again. Heavy heavy heavy. Maybe if I just rest my eyes for a moment. Yes I could do that. Just for a moment. So I let my lids slid over my eyes in sweet relief. Oh my. It was wonderful. I believe the thing even stop its horrid breathing to let me a moment of peace.

Sighing I opened my eyes.

Holy Jesus.

There was this moment when I was so startled I swear my heart stopped beating. Has this happen to you? You see something so unexpected that you are paralyzed from surprise. Like you suddenly turn into a petrified Barbie doll. Limbs rigid like ice and your innards stop?

This was what happened to me. My heart just fainted when I caught sight of it.

There was something pale moving in my closet. Oh no oh no oh no oh no oh no.

My heart beat went from zero to through the roof when it started to move closer. OH NO. I couldn't tell it was the reflection of the moon light through my window or if it was actually something. I froze, pleading that whatever it was wouldn't see me. My senses seem to take in everything in a fantastic clarity. Everything was under a microscope and gathered invisible light. Sounds were magnified that the rustling of my hair seemed obtrusively loud. I was so quintessentially frighten.

The closer it crept, tripping over my hazardous room, the more convince that it was actually something. It was coming to get me. Oh oh ooooooooohhhhhhh. Please don't get meeeeeeeee.

It was a short squat creature that walked on four muscularly built legs. Each leg had an array of six sharp looking fingers that got caught on my clothes. Claws used to rip through flesh like butter. Its little blah body was connected to this mask looking head that was overly large for its body. The mask face held no expression. Just two indentions for where the eyes should be. The whole creature was as pale as the moon light that reflected upon it. It skin held no texture, it was as smooth as marble.

I began to hyperventilate as it was getting sooo close. What was it going to do what was it going to do? The creature had this misty way of moving. Everything it did was smooth and curling like smoke.

Oh god, it was raising it's claw. Oh it was going to rip my face off. I hid my face with my hands, waiting for the pain to come. I waited and waited with my eyes scrunched tightly shut. But nothing happened. I peeped my eye open. The creature held a brass old fashion key. It glowed as if fire light was illuminated upon it. It was awful simple too.

I couldn't believe it. A key. This creature was giving me a key. Flabbergasted I took it from the creature. Oh my it was much more heavy then it looked. I even accidentally brushed my hand against the mask face and it was cold. The Mask face Stared at me intently even though it didn't have eyes. I knew it was looking at me. I knew it like I knew the thing knew when my eyes were closed. The Mask Face turned and glided away.

What was this all about?

I whipped the bed covers off and followed it into the closet. My fear had dissipated and in its place was raw inquisitiveness. A mountain of clothes that I hid in my closet was my obstacle as I followed the pale creature over it. Higher and higher we went. At some point everything got hazy as if my eyes were glassed over with some old grainy xanthium film effect. The clothes turned to books and rulers and such which made climbing more difficult.

The Mask face had a butt of a human And for some reason I felt embarrassed. Following a metaphorical moon over a mountain seemed somewhat ridiculous. It was ridiculous and I didn't care. It was a nice cute butt too. It was perfectly round, like said moon.

The key was getting rather heavy and hard to carry but I held on to it. The pale creature disappeared over the top. I sprinted with growing vivacity to keep up.

I ran and ran till there was no more to run on. I tumbled into nothingness in a slow kind of surprise. Like I was unaware that I even fell off the mountain of literature until a few moments well into it. Then with a growing sense of panic that I was free falling into the unknown did my heart complete amazing feats of gymnastic ability. It astonished me though once I look back on it. How slow and hazy my thinking was when I focused solely on catching that damn creature. It makes me chuckle now. That, for at least a few moments before my imminent disaster, my mind was unworried about fear and was only enraptured by curiosity.

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Criticism, everyone has it and every one needs it.


	4. Violet Doors

PART 2

Sleep

"**you don't get nothing from sleep but a dream."**

Don King

"Hush now baby, baby, dont you cry

Mother's gonna make all your **nightmares** come true

Mother's gonna put all her fears into you."

Pink Floyd

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"Those with the greatest awareness have the greatest **nightmares**."

Mahatma Gandhi

The thing about my great fall is that it took such a very long time. Enough time for me to ponder my situation and my precipitous demise. Well not precipitous, for I was floating rather deliberately through the air. Actually to tell the truth, I wasn't sure how fast I was falling, for when I think about it, I could still be plummeting through the air at a normal speed and it just being such a very long way down that I thought I was going at a leisurely pace or that with my fear that in my mind I delayed the process of time.

Despite whatever speed I was going, after my initial shock and horror, I was able to savor the feeling of falling with only a minimal amount of trepidation about my death that would surely follow this plunge. I'm sure whoever has fallen from a great height has experienced for a mere few moments. Dropping through the air offers a limited period of absolute liberty. I felt like I was flying. I felt that I had broken free of an law that bond me ever since I was conceived. That rule of gravity. Even though strictly speaking I was still under the influence of gravity.

Oh it was so wonderful. My insides twisted with excitement and ecstasy that I rarely was allowed to appreciate. Yes, I would be a rollercoaster junkie if I could afford and had the means to be. Only once when I just turned thirteen did I ride that marvelous contraption that sent you hurtling through the sky. It was painted wondrous glittering shades of purple and yellow that contrasted brilliantly.

This elation wore off after a time for it really did take some time to fall. I still had butterflies fluttering around my chest but not as intensely as before. I wondered briefly whether this was a fantasy all in my head. After some consideration I decided it was unlikely for I was actually enjoying my self too much. I glanced around to find nothing but darkness. It was a consuming gloom that ate up all the light. It was so vast and perpetual that I started to feel insignificant. Just one speck of me against this massive emptiness. It was so freaking intimidating that I started to undergo an odd combination of emotions. First it depressed the hell out of me. I was sure to be gobbled up forever more in this behemoth and wink out like a flame. Second, it gave me this incredible sense of hope for the potential of this blackness. I mean anything could happen, anything. This feeling filled me to the brim with this lightness that must have made my progression through the blackness even slower and made my heart jump and shudder.

The again my depression weighed me down, so these two conflicted emotions must have cancelled each other out and I went about the same velocity as ever.

I realized with a moment of astonishment that I still held the key that the Mask face gave me. I let go of it experimentally to find that the thing floated in front of me. I caught it and released it several times to assure myself that the key was falling at the same rate as I. Amused for only a small amount of time by the antics of the key I pocketed it and began to count. I don't know why I wanted to count, but it seemed like a good concept to see how long it would take for me to reach my end. I didn't know what I would use the information for because first so many seconds have already passed and I would not have an accurate amount and that as soon as I stopped counting I would be dead.

I counted anyway.

One two three five four seven ten eleven.

I stopped promptly, feeling that I did it wrong. I didn't know exactly what I was doing wrong either. I tried to count to twenty but I couldn't remember how and stopped because I was feeling quite fatuous.

Eventually and quite abruptly my fall had ended. I thought for a few tormented seconds that this was it. The end of me and how awfully unprepared I was for it. I would be squashed into goo, my bones shattered and my guts pulped. I made some incongruous sounds that would be humiliating if those were really my last sounds of existence. My fall was broken uncomfortably by some kind of scratchy material. Under a proper inspection it turned out to be string. A massive amount of vibrant and varied filament that was utterly tangled. That splayed out like a splash or iridescent water as soon as I landed.

Due to the height of my fall, I was deeply entwined into this mess. I rested for a few moments trying to figure out what to do. Luckily I was saved by this yarn which inexplicably appeared directly under me. The only thing was that it also held me prisoner for whenever I tried to struggle out the more tangled and messy it got. So I was stuck there for quite a while.

"Crap" I said to myself because I wanted to hear my voice. It felt very hoarse and prickly in my throat . Like I had been a mute. And now my first glorious word was "Crap".

I'm such a disappointment.

I peered out of my entanglement to find that I was in some kind of forest. A very eerie forest to be exact. It was the kind of woodland where all the trees were gnarled and blacken. As if a fire had licked at all of the trunks leaving them shining coal. All the trees where tragically thin and weedy like they were all anorexic little girls dancing under a lavender sky. Their branches reached for the sky, caressing and combing the low hazy condensation. The diminutive viridian leaves that antagonistically fought for their place in this picture, splendidly conflicted with everything.

There were many well beaten dusty paths that led through the trees, traveling to unknown places.

I longed to escape. I wanted it with a voracity that consumed my whole being.

I thrashed about violently, surging against my bonds with every ounce of effort. The strings sliced through my soft skin like butter as I ascended out of that pile of barb wire. With a final burst of energy I tumbled out. Panting harshly I examined my incisions, worried that I seriously wounded my self.

The lacerations only bled claret in limited quantities but they were all over my body. They were so curious to look at. I could clearly see my muscles on the edge of the gaps that turned slightly upwards in a smile. I could flex my muscles with a numb sort of pain to make them appear to chatter with each other.

I amused myself for a moment envision a talk between particularly large cuts on my biceps and thighs. Out of the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of that infuriating creature.

The Maskface was gliding away on one of the trails in it mysterious way. I scrambled up, wincing at my cuts, and followed that damn creature yelling.

"Please, wait for me."

The Maskface ignored me and continued on its merry little way. Not taking notice of anything Groaning with frustration I jogged to keep up with the Maskface. It was a very swift moving creature for being so stubby. For a while the Creature led me through the woodland on the winding trail. Eventually I did catch up to the Maskface, but I was at a full blown sprint to be abreast of it. It turned its massive head towards me, seemingly staring at me despite its lack of eyes. It looked at me and not the bloody well direction it was going for the whole thirty seconds that I was able to keep that frantic pace. I had to slow down because my cuts were bleeding again and my heart threaten to explode.

From then on, I kept a reasonable pace that kept me a good six meters behind the Maskface. That creature was certainly elusive. I was following it on this twisting path that wound through the trees like a god damn anaconda. So naturally I would lose sight of it. This was horrendously terrifying to me. Just the thought of it even being gone for more then a few moments made my muscles tense.

The thing about the path that I was on was that the edges were lined with these pretty little violets. I got really distracted by them though because they had the bodies of naked children with a violet flower for a head. They would squiggle and move like crazy, making these odd little laughing sounds. I was deathly afraid that I would accidentally kill one of them. I mean are they kids or flowers? Would they bleed and die if I picked one of them? I tried to keep away from them and their pudgy waving arms.

Eventually I followed the Maskface till it reached an clearing that the path faded into. The horrible thing about the clearing was it was chalk full of those violet children. So it was a sea of writhing of amethyst bodies. No way in hell was I able to get through there without smushing something.

However the Maskface went straight through. It absolutely petrify me as I saw the Maskface mow down the flower children who were quite fragile. At the slightest touch they would snap in half and an milky substance would excrete from their torsos . They gave these shrieking cries, still wiggling as the Mask face would scoop them up in its broad paw and sip their life from this delicate mouth that I didn't notice before. Man, was the Maskface mouth so petite, I bet it couldn't open wider then a dime.

The Maskface started this disturbing behavior where it would lean back on its hunches and sup very elegant like on these screaming children. It would then sit there and blow these little bubbles that looked like pearls through its slight mouth and the creamy bubbles would float away like sea foam.

I suppose when I look back on it now it was very pretty, but at the time I was getting sick.

All I saw was the massacre of dead babies surrounding that creature, twitching weakly as their souls floated up on those bubbles.

Soon all the flowers in the clearing were screaming. I don't know whether or not they had ears or anything but they were bawling like crazy. It was such a grinding sound. It's the kind of sound that sounded like an air raid siren. Not like I had ever listen to a real siren like that before. Nobody would care to bomb the middle of nowhere. I had heard it in the movies though. God, what an awful sound. It would be all quiet and peaceful and then that wail would go off and everything would be absolutely silent and only the siren would be going.

It gave me gooseflesh.

I swear to god that's how those babies were crying.

I wanted to rip my god damn ears off, it got so loud.

The Mask face had its fill and stopped eating the flowers and the babies whimpered. Then everything got absolutely hushed. The mask face continue on to the center of the clearing where it still killed babies but they were the only ones who would cry.

I had to follow the Maskface. It's inexplicable, my need to be near that thing. Even after what it did to the violets. So I followed tentatively the path of destruction that the Maskface had created. It was so revolting. All of the flowers buttery organs slipped out of their frail little bodies. Every time I would step there would be this crunching crisp sound. Like stepping on fresh snow.

God.

What I did next was absolutely atrocious. It was a sin, without a doubt, that I will never forgive myself for.

I stooped down and picked up one of the dead flowers. I rolled it's lithe structure in my hands. It was a little girl. She was as soft as dough. I raised her up to my lips and licked her broken insides. I actually liked it too. It tasted like sweet condensed milk except some how fresher. Like it was never canned before. God it was thick. Like melted chocolate.

I wanted to kill myself.

I wanted to die so badly for molesting that flower that way.

I would have, if I knew someone would throw me in a river or something so that no one prod me and open me up.

I set the violet down and continued to follow that creature. I hate myself.

However, during the whole thing about the flower the mask face had disappeared. I started to go ballistic. I mean I went off the wall. My eyes bugged out and began to tear out my hair I was so panicky.

What was I going to do? What was I going to do? WhatwasIgoingtodotodotodotodotodo?

You see I hung on to the mask face like I would my own mothers breast. It was my light, my guide and guardian. I know it didn't do much other then lead me but I was desperate for that. I needed to be shown the way or otherwise I would be lost. I would be alone.

I didn't want to be alone. I cant stand myself anymore.

I stood there shaking like a mad. Like I was a fucking leaf or something. Feeling like some abandoned baby, fresh from the birth canal, screaming for something I didn't even know of yet.

I didn't know how long I stood there freaking out, but when I did move it hurt. I was so misplaced.

When I decided to finally looked at my situation, I realized that I was surrounded by doors. I guess I was so obsessed with the flowers I didn't perceive much of anything else. The doors came in every shape and size. They were in the trees, floating through the air, and leading down deep underground. I tried the nearest door floating by that was as big as my head and shaped as such. It was locked. So were all the other doors that were within my vicinity. My vicinity, by the way, was everywhere were I didn't have to kill flowers. Which delighted me because I found the path in which the Maskface had gone.

I felt like an idiot briefly for not realizing that earlier but it was washed away in my waves of momentary happiness.

I followed the path of dead children to a door that was a grand old thing. It was made out of some kind of ebony wood that shined wonderfully in the weak light. I wondered whether the door was made from the surrounding trees. It had these intricate carved designs that were a delight for the fingers to run across.

I tried the door but it was locked.

Argh.

Why are all the doors locked?

"Because you don't have a key." I said rather smugly, like I was some kind of stupid.

I jumped a little. I was very startled by the emergence of me. I didn't expect to talk to myself at all. I usually have to initiate these chats with myself. Then out of the blue the other me starts to talk like it wasn't me at all. It was a little scary.

"Who are you?" I asked myself rather timidly. God, I hate being so damn frighten of myself.

"You" the other me laughed.

"You you you you you you" They chanted.

All of the other personas of me began to chant. I was so mixed up I didn't know who I was anymore. I began to chant with them.

"You you you you you"

"I think we do have a key, actually" somebody said. I didn't know who.

"No we don't."

"Yeas we do ya arse hole."

"Stawp piwt, yew idiows!"

"Vat about tra shat yurs gaping pie howle too."

"Look the keys right here in the pocket."

"Um…ah well you see, we ah dont kna-oow that For ah suure."

"For sure about what? Fuck head"

"Abount ah …. Anything."

"Please stop fighting….please please."

"See, here it is"

Someone held the key before all of us. Everyone quieted down as we tried the key in the lock. It worked. Everyone got excited and began to babble into a indistinct muddle.

We opened it.

And there was my room.

_My_ room. As much as I hate it.

Everyone was severely disappointed but not me. In fact I was able to find the real me from the mess of the others because I was just so damn elated to see that.

Oh you don't even know how flipping relieved I was. See, I'm like this high strung electrical wire and I was just so manically stretched to the goddamn breaking point that I thought there was a good chance of my existences just snapping. However, the sight of my room was just nirvana.

I wanted to pass through, but the thing is I was way too massive. All the other me's took up an obnoxious amount of space. It was despondent cause to get through that door.

What a slap in the face.

No, not a slap. More like someone took a razor and carved my face into ribbons. More like someone opened me up and dangled my heart in front of me by its arteries. More like getting fucked by a knife.

I sat down on a bed of corpses and broke.

I have been broken so many times but I fix my self. I always manage to mend myself. I have to sew up my tattered mix-match ways. If I don't ,I fall into a pit of fading. Of going out all together like a candle. Now as I sit here on dead things I wonder if I'm worth fixing. Why shouldn't I join them in an endless sleep.

Oh but I'm a coward.

I cant abide sleeping.

So I lay there wishing to die but not really. Just something in-between sleeping and waking. I cry to myself in a muffled sort of way. Then I feel myself being carried far away. On a stream of tears. I'm drowning. I know I should struggle as my desperate lungs fill with salty liquid, but It's as if my wish has been answered. I'm in a hazy border between Life and death. Sleep and wakefullness.

I float on a horizon of the universe.

????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

Eh, what do you think?


	5. Caterpillar

Yes, one more chapter till we get to meet the Mad Hatter. Excitement!!! Thank you all of my lovely readers and reviewers.

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Have you ever noticed there is never any third act to a nightmare? They bring you to a climax of terror and then leave you there.

Max Beerbohm

I couldn't awake from the nightmare That sucked me in and pulled me under Pulled me under Oh... That was so real.

Jeff Buckely

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I guess when your dying you begin to think a certain way. I suppose its different for everyone because dying is such a personal experience. I'm pretty sure everyone does have the thought come waltzing through their brain about what happens when they finally die. It's not a greatly profound thought because they have been thinking about that question for the majority of their life.

What is really abstruse about when one is dying is that _you_ are going to find out. No more speculating or haphazard guessing. You are going to know. You are going to know the secret that plagued humanity ever since we really began to be human.

Oh it excites me.

Oh it frightens me.

I'm excited because life's question will be answered. I'm frighten because what if its like sleeping?

I would much prefer to be dying for the rest of eternity. To always be right on the edge of two polar extremes and be happy .For I will always be in an ecstatic state of that I am about to know and always be just out of the grasp of eternal sleep.

I know that I will never get my way though.

Just as I know that I _have_ to sleep, I know that I _have_ to die.

It's rather fucking disappointing.

So I try to enjoy this moment of being in the twilight of human existence.

I try to savor it with as much scrutiny as I can possibly muster as I feel myself slip away.

However, I'm saved. If you want to call it that. For I personally think being taken out of this state of bliss is bad news either way. I feel the current drag me to a boggy shore of life. Being pressed for a yes or no answer like life or death, I'd pick life.

Though for some reason I feel smaller. It also was abnormally quiet. It took me a moment for it to dawn upon me that all the other me's had _died_. As far as I know I'm the only one alive.

Oh.

I can't come to a conclusion on whether or not this was bad.

I'm trying to feel sad that they all died but I cant beat up any enthusiasm to feel remorse. Damn, I'm an ass hole. I decided after much debate to just come to an apathetic view on the whole situation and call it done.

So I'm stuck within the muck and mire of this river bank. I don't move or anything. I just sink in further into the mud. I'm resting with my eyes closed. I guess I really don't want to face life again. I'm such an ungrateful little nit.

But the mud is rather nice. It's all cool and enveloping. It's rather comforting. Like I'm swimming in pudding. Well not swimming. Since I wasn't moving and all. I spoiled it though once I realize how absolutely filthy I am.

God, this just ruined my mood.

I scrambled out of that mess with some kind of effort. I kept on sliding back pathetically into the river though. The steep walls of the embankment were being bitches. However like a pimp with a strong back hand I was able to have my way with them.

Which meant that I finally climbed over them. I kept on coughing up all kinds of water too.

Geez.

I was terribly wearisome. Like I had one of those dreams where I was searching for something with so much exertion that I hardly got a moment of proper rest. Well, once I think about it, I always have those types of dreams. The ones where you don't really sleep at all.

I also had this painful feeling in my abdomen. Like it was a squeezing and curling fist. It was grasping at something not there.

Over all it was unpleasant, to say the least.

Plus I was just smothered with mud. Like I was born from the earth and had her womb comforts still all over me.

I sat on this dead grass, breathing deep long breaths.

I should eat. Last time was years ago for all I know. Glancing around I saw nothing of edible interest. Just grass and those trees. Maybe if I was a cow, or a llama. Llamas are cooler then cows.

Those flowers were fortunately nowhere within my sight. I don't think I could be able to bring myself to even touch one of those delicate creatures again.

Then again I might be in a difficult position if I don't eat.

So I picked myself up and wondered through the trees. I walked for a questionable time, examining the perpetual scenery. By now the mud began to crack and flake off in bits and pieces.

My clothes were rags clotted with mud and for some reason I couldn't bare the thought of being anymore filthy then I absolutely had to. To have grime crush up against you your finally clean skin seemed horrible to me. I wiggled out of my shirt which was plastered to me like a second skin. It didn't bother me at all at the time that I was running around half naked. I had some decency and kept my pants as much as I hated to.

Then like in some book I came upon a huge mushroom. But it wasn't also big compared to the towering mushrooms that rose behind it. The mushroom seemed to be on a boundary of a strange forest compose entirely of fungi of all shapes, sizes and color.

Even more curious is that there was a massively obese caterpillar that was sucking daintily upon a thin cigarette. I don't think you could even call that large sack of crepe flesh a Caterpillar, It was more like a pale fat grub that shone faintly with a tinge of metallic turquoise in the weak light.

The insect had extravagant face paint plastered on like a mask highlighting a more feminine nature on the completely circular face of the grub. Which gave me the impression that it was a she. She painted an infrared shade of boisterous color upon her non-existent lips and rimmed her black pebble eyes with an indigo kohl which she feathered upward to give the illusion of having eye lashes.

This creature reclined on top of the buckling fungus as a glob of quivering jello might.

Completely unaware or too god damn hoity to take notice of me as I crept closer.

After I was almost directly under the intimidating girth of the grub and had to stand tip toe to see over the mushroom did I pluck some nerve to speak.

"Ehello" I slurred. God, why did I slur? Can't I freakin annunciate?

The caterpillar ignored me for a few minutes, taking long deep drags on her cigarette and blowing the smoke into my face.

"Who ARE you?" She asked. But she prolonged her vowels so it sounded more like whooooooooo AAAAAAAAAREEEEEEEE yooouuuuuuuu? I couldn't help but suspect that she was mocking me.

I thought about it for a few moments genuinely puzzled and irked by her question. She said it in such a breathy way. Like every word was blown into me with a torrent of air. Who asked those kinds of questions anyway? Especially when you first meet someone. That was one the most difficult question that I could think to ask. Of course people could answer "Well I'm Bob I live in New Mexico and I'm neurologist blah blah bla".

But I found that didn't answer anything at all.

I couldn't possible encompass all of what I was even in a whole novel. I know that sounds like I have an ego the size of a frikken blimp. But there's so much to being simply alive. Even in books where you read a bit about characters, you have to make up the rest of their personality in your head.

I don't think anyone can honestly say that they can fully say who they are.

So I answered in the most respectable and intelligent way I could.

"I don't know" I made sure that every word was clear and concise.

The caterpillar snorted wrinkling her minute nose in disdain. She took a few more puffs on her cigarette contemplating. Her rolls of flesh were sagging off the mushroom perversely.

"Iiiif yooou dooooon't knooooow whoooo yooouuou aaaare theeeeen dooo yooouuu knoooow aaaanythiiing aaat aaall?" She asked. Again, she exaggerated vowels into prolonged ordeals. She even waved her multiple arms to accent her speech. They were so reedy and thin that they look like her cigarette. I wondered how in the hell was that blob of fat was able to get around.

"I know nothing" I replied.

"Suuuurley yooouu knooooww oooof seeeex?"

This baffled me so much that I rolled back onto my heels, the caterpillars face disappeared but that was only part of her that was gone from view. That was one of last things I thought a caterpillar would ask me. I caught myself and tip toed to peek over the mushroom again.

She stared at me with her beady eyes. They were so empty of any color or light.

"Whoooo are yooouuu?" The silly thing asked again. She seemed absolutely serious.

"Wait what..I…I thought you …didn't you?" I Stumbled upon my words in surprise. I decided to stop and start anew.

"Can you please help me? I don't know where I am and I lost of a lot of who I am. Please ma'am Please?"

"Aaaarrreee yooouuu byyy aaanyyy chaaance aa whoooore?" she spat, ignoring my question as if I never said it before.

"What?" I barked, startled at this new turn of conversation. A whore? Nonononononononono.

"No!" I said a little too brashly like I was trying to hide something.

"Of course not." I said more calmly to prove the point.

"Do you know what sex is?"

"Ya"

"Theeeeen yooouuu are aaa whoooore" The caterpillar said haughtily.

I wrinkled my nose incredulously.

"How the hell does that work?"

The grub began to speak faster and faster as it got more excited. Eventually her voice became deep as well.

"To know what it is like to have something pumping inside you that isn't your heart. To explode with ecstatic waves as the dirty act twists your soul with pleasure. In and out like your breath. To be dripping with milky fluid as you sell your innocence….Only a whore would know this."

The grubs voice cracked as it sounded completely masculine. I wasn't sure what gender it was anymore.

The insect began to pant and moan as it set its beady little eyes on me. I became increasingly uncomfortable. Hell I was panicking.

The caterpillar began to scream that I was a whore. It swung its tail at me as if it wanted to knock me over or something. Oh god. It wasn't that. It was a hundred million times worst.

I remember that I closed my eyes in preparation of the pain to surely come and put my hands up in defense. God was I in a state of utter trepidation.

I caught the end of the grubs tail quite by accident. You see, the end of it moistened my palm. Creamy liquid dripped from my hand like it was the blood of flower children. When I opened my eyes wide, I was gagging and dry heaving. I dropped the thing in my hands like a hot coal. It was as hot and pulsed like one. All I could do is stare at the phallic object leaking in a puddle on the dead ground.

A heartbeat, another and another. My legs carried me away from that place in unison with the pumping of my heart. I could hear the caterpillar screech hysterics at me fade away.

Run run RUN. Muscle constricting and releasing as I fled into a forest of enormous fungi that stood eerily quiet. The mushrooms rose high into the air on thing spidery trunks and exaggerated caps blocking out the weak sun. only strips of light illuminated my way. Glitter of spores completed the forests. Run, stupid, get away.

That was all I could do, run. My mind was blinded with a white screen of disgust and horror.

As I continued with my manic escape I could hear the faint last words of the caterpillar that would haunt my mind.

"Keeeeep yoooouuur Teeemper!"


	6. Cheshire Cat

Okie doky folks! Here we are with the next wonderful chapter filled with happy thoughts and pleasures! Make sure you keep on smiling! What ever you do don't stop! You might spontaneously combust if you do. Haha exploded brains makes you happy ! So happy.

AHHHH so much happiness I can barely contain myself.

Well in more depressing news this is the last chapter before we get to meet a version of the Mad Hatter that I created out of my head sack. Oh woe is I. Now all of you are going to skip ahead to the hot steamy lemony scenes. You perverts.

What happens if I decided to make the Hatter an old disgusting fart who has a giant puss filled boil on his upper lip. Ooohhh that's sexy. I bet some of you would read for disgusting pedophile boil sex. Mmmmhhh sounds like the best thing ever.

Well to disappoint all of you boil fetish people out there, it won't happen. It should though because it disgusting and horrifying. But it won't. How Sad. So place your bets among yourselves. What does he look like? What will he do? Will there be a lemon scene? Is his real name the MAD HATTER? Does he have a jumbo mustache?

ARGH the tension is slowly killing me like those soap operas. But all should be revealed in a short period of time decided upon by the management. Don't look at me like that, I only work here.

TADA!!!!!

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"Operationally, God is beginning to resemble not a ruler but the last fading smile of a cosmic Cheshire cat."

Sir Julian Huxley

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Keep your temper.

Keep your freaking temper.

Don't stop, DON'T STOP,

RUN RUN RUNNNN!!!

But most of all keep your temper.

Don't get carried away on the tide of emotional stress. Keep yourself calm and still like a puddle. Let all the worrisome particles that cloud my puddle settle and clear the water. That nasty caterpillar stomped into my pristine puddle, making it muddy.

Hell who am I kidding, my puddle was never "pristine". It's a bog of turmoil. It's a disgusting mess that's out of hand.

But keep your temper and everything will be fine.

How can I keep my temper? I'm falling apart at the seams. I'm a rag doll that been torn too much by restless nights

Temper TEMPER TEMPER.

RUN RUN RUN.

God, I was choking on my breathe as I sprinted aimlessly. But it was all so beautiful. From the far away balcony of fear and exhaustion I saw the glittering white spore shed from the caps above like snow. I could see the fish-like gills exhaling their spawn upon me. White specks floating down from their coffee velvet origins.

A sweet old smell of moth eaten linens pervaded into my nostrils.

The whole fungi forest become hazy from the raining spores obscuring my vision. Everything had a foggy dusty feeling like something ancient. The forest was old, growing for generation upon generation in silence and reverence. You could get lost in here. You could die in here without realizing that any time had past at all, it was a twilight place.

Fear kept everything in sharp, painfully clear perception. In retrospect I suppose meeting the caterpillar was a good thing. It was the guardian of this damn forest, ensuring that visitors get safely through.

If this was true why had it screamed keep your temper.

Keeping your temper in this mad place was death.

Something on the edge of my vision materialized. Something pale and quick. At first I thought it was just the spore tricking my mind. The object was persistent though, disappearing and reappearing the edge of my peripherals like a phantom. I decided to follow it as a whimsy of intent. Soon it solidified into a concrete creature, my Maskface.

Oh how long it seemed since I followed this being into this horrible reality. Now it was guiding my once again. I was deeply moved by this creature, I was frighten that it was leading me into an ever downward spiral of treachery. I was frighten whether it was really there or just a fancy.

I followed the Maskface like a child. Hopelessly dependent on it. The short stocky thing was the vital point of attention of all my senses. I cant lose it look what happened when I lost it.

Oh no.

I was losing it already. It was fading into the fog it was vaporizing into the mist.

GOD DAMN NO

I increased my mad pace, trying to keep up with the disappearing creature. It soon was replaced with a small cottage that was fast approaching.

There. It disappeared into there. Into that tiny structure of wood and white wash that was surrounded by dead flowers. No where else could it have gone.

I finally stopped my frantic movement and collapsed promptly on my pulsating legs. My muscles were shaking with overexertion. It took countless moments to regain my quivering composure. My body burned with every movement, but I limped near the cottage.

Shouting and screaming emitted undistinguishable through the thin walls. A sudden torrent of books and rulers flew through the windows almost injuring me. The sound that glass made from impact was jarring like dropping a dish on hard tile. Soon an array of pots and pails came flying out of every orifice of the cottage. I hid beside the door curious as to what the hell was happening.

As soon as there was a break in the frightful noise and projectile house-ware. I snuck into the cottage.

It was an old fashion school room. It was incredibly silent. Like the moment you lower a relative into the grave. Neat rows of children faced the front.

Boy girl boy girl was the pattern across the room. A large chalk board was the entire back wall. Scribbled upon it was nonsense like two and two makes five or two and two makes fish. Disturbing pictures were drawn upon the board that was inappropriate for children so young. The anatomy of the male figure, the human figure flayed, and a disemboweled woman on a cross.

Standing in front of the board was a tall perverse lady with a chin jutting out like a knife. A large mole bubbled out of the middle of her fore head like a third eye. The mass of tarnished steel wires laid heavy upon her head in such a way that was similar to a sack of flour. Overall she gave off the aurora of a being who knows nothing but she saw.

In her hand she was clutching the neck of a very small kitten. It's head lolled to the side like a sack of marbles. It's eye's were disgustingly huge and crossed eyed. It's body was limp and placid. The kitten was pathetic, like those bottled cats. I couldn't tell if it was dead. The lady was squeezing the poor thing though. I could hear the small clear pops of bones breaking in the little thing's spine.

It has to be dead and the woman killed it. This conclusion was deeply depressing to me.

Oh my Dilah.

The lady looked down to the kitten examining it like a curios infant. She played with cat's limbs, poking it with long dagger like fingers. She pulled back it's face to make it smile. Its tiny teeth were like shards of porcelain laid in strawberry silk. The lady evidently became bored with the creature because she threw it.

No, she hurled it to the ground. And the kitten actually bounced. A rush of air escaped into my lungs as I lunged forward.

One of the neat children turned around. That stopped me in my motion. The child had no face. no eyes, ears, or nose. Just a smooth plane of skin that was interrupted only by a gapping mouth that couldn't close. The teeth were a horrendous mess. Ugly and miss-matched the teeth were in a state of incredible battle with each other. Molars screaming at the incisors, Bicuspids missing, and all stained a rotting brown color that was almost indigo.

Oh God. That wasn't a child.

The thing stared at my for a moment making whimpering sounds. Actually I couldn't tell if it was looking at me because of it's lack of optical sensory. But it's head was pointed in my general direction. It's mouth worked to form words. Pressing up and down, the tongue swilling about, but nothing came out other then guttural animals sounds.

The child's head turn back forward once again.

"COME HERE"

I jerked my head up startled at the booming disruption of the still air.

The lady. The lady that killed baby kittens was glaring at me with here droopy dog eyes. I gulped, waiting for one of the faceless children to stand up. But no, all of them turned to face me. Dozens of them began to making there moaning beast sounds with their disgusting mouths. The sound reached it's zenith almost to unbearable to stand. I slapped my hands over my ears trying to stop the unpleasant frequency from grating against my ear drums.

I lurched towards the front trying to escape the children in a fit of desperation. The sound stopped and I was next to the lady.

" CLASS" she screamed " WHAT IS MY NAME"

The children things muttered their ugly non-words in unison.

"THAT'S CORRRECT"

The Lady turned to me and even though I was close to her she shrilled

"DID YOU HEAR THAT"

"No" I responded. The children were so unsettling I couldn't think straight.

"THEY SAID DUCHESS YOU LITTLE NITTY IDOIT"

" O-oo-oh" I didn't know what to do. I never did well when I'm put on the spot like this. With so many people evaluating my every move. It made me so nervous. My heart would beat faster and my hands clammed up. I was reduced to a stuttering moron.

The Duchess snorted and diverted her attention to the front of the class.

"KITTENS ARE VERY SPRINGY AND HAVE ELASTIC BONES. AS YOU SAW THEY QUITE LITERALLY BOUNCED WHEN THROWN HARD ENOUGH. FOR HOMEWORK I SUGGEST THAT YOU DO THAT WITH YOUR OWN KITTENS."

She paused to collect the kitten. She pulled the lips of the kitten back once again, inducing that horrible grin.

"ALTHOUGH THE BEST BOUNCY KITTENS ARE THE CHESIRE VARIETY" Her whole form was rocked with laughter as she barked. The class of faceless children began to make a hacking sound on cue from the duchess.

The duchess stopped abruptly but the class didn't. They kept on laughing their hacking sounds.

HACK HACKSQUEAL

The hacking to squealing and then children slouched over fat gooey rolls of flesh that developed from their thin tight bodies. They all turned incredibly pink from squealing so hard. The doubled over from the exertion of it. The faceless children crawled around the floor squealing and snorting.

Soon they didn't look like children at all but pigs. They still lacked a face but they were pink fat little piglets swarming about none the less.

The Duchess turned to me and cooed

"Aaaaah, they learned so much today" She then shoved the dead kitten into my arms and began her laugh that was similar to the sound that a dog makes when it's about to throw up.

They piglets swarmed around me, nipping at my pajama bottoms. They began to tear at the clothe and I danced around trying to avoid them.

God I was so glad that I kept my pants. It was protection from these crazy animals. But not enough. A pig was snuffling around my toes that was quite ticklish for a moment. I chuckled wretchedly as I tried to avoid the beasts. A sharp pain came shooting up my leg like an arrow.

The fucking pig bit me.

I howled in pain as I tried to kick the pigs out of my way. Blood splattered everywhere. Wait….why is there…so much blood.

It bit off my toe.

JESUS JESUS JESUS.

PANIC PANIC PANICKEEP YOR TEMPER.

I grasped the dead kitten to my chest as I stumbled and limped out of that awful awful cottage. Air escaped my lungs as I choked on rising stress. I scrambled my way out of the school room, unable to perceive my world in anyway at all.

I went on and on at my sickly pace. I could no longer sprint, at best I could power walk. God, You never realize how freaking important toes are until one of them is eaten. I didn't stop until I could no longer hear the pig screams. My shuffling walk became painful from all the dirt and rot from the ground being shoved up into my wound.

I had to sit down.

I chose a large mushroom to sit under and carefully laid the kitten to my side. By now the rigid condition of death had set into the creature. The kitten felt like a plank of wood wrapped in fur.

I picked up my foot stretching it toward me.

Oh my.

My little pinky toe was hang on by just a thread of skin.

Uck

I think I threw up in my mouth a little.

The little nub of flesh that was once known as my toe hung off to the side all pale and white like snow. The filth that Clogged up my toe thankfully stop any more blood from spilling.

I suppose it should hurt very badly. Hell it was painful as fuck. I mean some animal had come along and bit through flesh and _bone._ My foot was swollen and burning fire. But the mushroom forest has an effect on the mind. It slows how the brain reacts to stimuli. Although my fear and pain gripped me from the oblivion of stunted observances the mushrooms still affected me so that I was able to handle it.

I was able to still think thanks to the supreme fear and the calming spores. It provided an medium in which I was almost functioning at normal.

Of course I was completely unaware of this egregious balance. Only with time and retrospect was I able to understand what was happening. But for the then and now of that particular moment all I was thinking was shit.

Shit Shit Shitty shit poopy doo

I had to get that freaking piece of toe off. If it was more securely attached I would have been able to ignore it and let gangrene to set in and let it rot off. But nooooo, the pig couldn't do the job completely, it just let my toe hang there for me to deal with. It was almost completely ripped off, I could finish the job.

GOD GOD GOD

I tried to justify the pain that was surely to come. If I don't rip it off now it will only get worst. Better to have some hurt now then an extreme amount later. I don't think I should just pull it off. I mean skin is pretty tough and I might fuck something up. Better to cut it with something.

Now here's the problem, I having to cut fucking with. I'm in the middle of freaking do da fungi forest. There's nothing that's sharp enough, there's no sharp pieces of rock that I could see. In a desperate last ditch effort I search myself. Perhaps there is a sharp bit of earring that I forgot about or maybe I forgot a about a knife in my pocket

Haha haaa ho ho hehe heh HA

Oh god, what an freaking comedian.

I stuff my hands into my pockets anyway. What's the harm in trying.

Wait what?

I brushed up against some metal hot from my body heat. I pulled it out and with much a grander, it was that stupid key. I had forgotten about it and it returned from the bowels of my pocket to blatantly remind the Maskface's lack of company. Why had it even given me this scrap of metal anyway.

A key.

A freaking key.

Jesus I'll think about it later. Right now I need to saw off my toe and the key was sharp enough to be used as a make shift knife.

Oh my.

I closed my eyes in preparation of the act.

Breathe in and out, calm yourself

Keep your temper.

In a furry I opened my eyes wide. I grabbed my toe stretching the last bit of skin that connected me to it and sawed away. I was pulling so hard that the last sinew tore from the pressure of it.

The pain was bearable, but the dead toe that was clutched in my hand was not.

I emptied my stomach all over the dead kitten and cried.

Strange how I was able to handle everything up till that moment.

Strange How I was able to keep it together for such a long time.

Strange how my fucking toe set me off.

It's an odd little world.


	7. Martin Aggersion Damien Harett

Dear readers,

I am eternally apologetic for baffling length of time you patiently waited for this document to be published. One must realize that it was most assuredly not my fault. Management has dictated that my attention should be drawn elsewhere and censored a great deal of this chapter. I , however, changed it all back into it's orginally glory in the dead of night for your pleasures.

P.S. I am fully aware of what an incredibly shitty writer I am

P.S.S. Do not forgive me.

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**My dear Sir, take any road, you can't go amiss. The whole state is one vast insane asylum. Author: James L. Petigru**

**Much madness is divinest sense To a discerning eye; Much sense the starkest madness. 'Tis the majority In this, as all, prevails Assent, and you are sane; Demur,--you're straightway dangerous, And handled with a chain. Author: Emily Dickinson**

**A human being will never be completely whole.**

**From the first moments of life we are forever losing bits of hair and skin particles. Scattering them all over the world to be absorbed by the Earth. We renew ourselves but yet we are never completely there. It's such a insignificant process that we rarely process it into our conscious minds. We never miss the dead skin cells or hair follicles.**

**However there is instants in which one sharply feels the lack of a proportion in one's psychical body. Such as when you lose a tooth or an arm or even your entire lower torso. I suppose you even feel it when you give birth to a child. **

**Something that was yours entirely was expelled into the world to become its own being. The feeling of loss is notable and shapes us into something we didn't quite expect. **

**Our mind is never complete either. Thousands upon millions of thoughts and memories past into oblivion every day without notice. The lost thoughts float into some void that we shall almost never recover them from. For they never leave some tangible evidence for us humans to find and examine like hair or skin. **

**They just disappear as if they never existed. But they did. Like humans they were born from nothingness and for a brief time they existed in our heads. However, I am unsure whether thoughts become something else when they die like humans or do they return to nothingness.**

**It's all part of some cosmic mumbo jumbo that I can't really deal with right now in my current state. **

**But I digress from my philosophic tirade.**

**You never notice that your losing your mind until you lose a large proportion of it. Then you notice how it was disintegrating. But the wonderful thing about the human body and psyche is that it regenerates itself into something stronger.**

**But there is a certain point in which you know that you crossed a line. When you cant take anymore and it all downhill from there. You begin to come apart at the seams.**

**You'll never be able to pin point when it started because its been happening all your life. But the moment you took a step too far you'll know immediately.**

**Like when your holding your amputated toe in your hands. Of course I'm sure that me losing my toe wasn't the sole reason for me to consciously acknowledge my mental break down. I'm thinking there must be a plethora of events and reasons that lead up to this moment. But I had the concrete dead evidence in my hand and I just lost it.**

**I didn't know exactly what had broken but I knew something was unwell and I was ill prepared to fix it.**

**I sat rocking back and forth. Without any coherent thought striking me. God I was lost always lost lost LOST.**

**What do I do now. What have I've been doing. I always thought that I had purposeful reasons for all my wonderings. But now that I think about it, I had no purpose. Oh god that scared me. If I had no purpose then why should I even exist. **

**I'm just a waste.**

**No, there must be reasons for me to do what I do. I just forgot that's all.**

**"****Your right" a small voice squeaked.**

**I nodded eagerly. That's right, I forgot. I've always been forgetful.**

**"****It'll come back to you" The voice continued. It was so quiet like the whispering of leaves I barely noticed it.**

**Yep it'll come back. I just have to be patient and wait. But what should I do in the mean time? **

**I picked of the small creature to my side. It's fur was clotted from bile and stuck out in stiff spikes. I held the kitten at eye level and repeated my question aloud.**

**I didn't expect an answer or anything. I mean, the thing was dead. I merely asked it a question for my own sanity's sake. You know, instead of always talking to myself in my head.**

**Oh jeez. Like talking to myself aloud is any better.**

**Well at least I was talking to something other than myself.**

**And since I expected nothing, the kitten spoke unexpectedly.**

**"****what you've always been doing" The kitten murmured. It's small slack mouth barely moving. It looked like it was suckling on it's mothers teat when it spoke. It was extremely adorable but surprising.**

**I dropped it in shock and watched it bounce a little. I quickly regained my wits. I felt a little bad for dropping it, but then again _it is _****dead. I picked it up again, gently**

**"****What?" I asked it, not believing it spoke at all. That it was only a sad event made up by my addled brain to help make some sense to things. But I fail to see how a talking dead kitten would make anything make more sense.**

**"****Keep following the maskface, it'll help. I swear." Again I could only just hear it. It was as though my conscience was speaking to me.**

**I held the kitten close to my chest, ignoring the horrid smell of it. Was that really what I have to do. Follow that fucking mask thing. All that thing has done was lead me into one hellish situation after the next. Shit.**

**I'll get up and wander around, and if I run into the maskface again I might follow it.**

**"****Please" I heard the kitten murmur.**

**Whatever.**

**Doing something distracted me from the reality of the shit that has been happening.**

**I rolled onto my feet, wincing from the numb searing pain. I spent a moment or two searching for the key and pocketed it and began on my merry way.**

**The key was somehow very important in the whole scheme of things, I don't know how. But it's best to keep it just in case.**

**Wait….**

**Didn't it open the door back into my life. That key provided a way of here. Thank God I didn't lose it earlier. I stroke the key reassuringly. It gain a whole new value that I felt stupid for not noticing before.**

**I still held the kitten close to my heart as I hobbled my way through the fungi forest.**

**The kitten was incredibly helpful. Every so often it would whisper directions to avoid the dangers of the forest. Which I didn't what the dangers were exactly because I never encountered them, thanks to the kitten. It also told me how to get out of the forest.**

**It was a relief after of hours of walking with an incredibly sore foot, to see the dark edges of mushroom land. I dragged up my pace a bit as I near the end.**

**As it turned out I walked almost straight into another freaking forest. Only a thin strip of meadow separated the two forests.**

**Tall grass waved gently in the breeze and fireflies lit up the starless indigo night. The only celestial body in the sky was a waxing blue moon.**

**It was beautiful to say the least.**

**In the mid point of the meadow was a white wash church that was surrounded by a decrepit wrought iron fence. The walls of the church had large windows that stretched from the ground to the roof. Most of these were broken or completely gone.**

**I walked closer in awe of the little church. As I moved closer I could see that the church's garden was over run with weeds and toys. It was eerie as a wind chime made out of spoons clattered with the wind.**

**I decided to take a peek inside since it seem uninhabited and I really needed to rest. I walked through he front gate cautiously. Just above the church door was a sign that read **

**Capimus congregatio morbus**

**Maybe if I knew any Spanish I could enlighten the masses of what I thought that meant. I don't know. I'm pretty sure the sign was in Latin. Maybe if I knew any Latin would be more appropriate for translating. Ah well, my nonlinguistic capabilities never cease to amaze me. . I limped inside. It was cool, cooler than outside and almost completely dark. Bits of moon ray shined through to offer a little illumination.**

**It a moment for me to adjust to the dark, but soon I was able to see an a long table covered with a moth eaten clothe and a countless array of cutlery, pans, plates, cups, and teapots.**

**All of the dinner ware was in every imaginable mess of color and size, Jumbled in a mess that would have made a hobo wince.**

**I shuffled along the table grazing my fingers over the chipped china,**

**A deep ragged breathing startled me.**

**I stood frozen in my spot next to an impressive mountain of saucers with pale red poppies painted delicately upon them. Oh nooooo.**

**I could see a slumped figure at the end of the table, and I was only two or three chairs away from it.**

**The silhouette raised its head and for a sickening moment I was prepared for a puss slobbering monster rat to launch itself at me.**

**Hey I was ready for anything. Well not _ready_ per say. I think I was _expecting_ some horrific mutated something.**

**I had absolutely no idea what to do. No physical course of action, no response, no nothing.**

**The only thing that I did do was prepare my psyche for some new shock to scar the fabric of my conscious.**

**My heart leapt into my esophagus as the surge of adrenaline made my palms all sweaty and cold.**

**A boy.**

**Just a boy.**

**The relief came washing over my nerves like honeyed milk.**

**No monster.**

**Just a boy a few years older then me.**

**He was a gaunt hollow thing. Like a wraith, he sat stiff like a corpse in his mangy throne like chair. His head cocked at an angle towards me, smiling with all of his yellowed teeth. His hair was a dark tangle mess with no method to it's madness.**

**As time progressed and I got to know the bastard better, I could theorize that perhaps at one time he was handsome. I could see the remnants of his beauty in his light eyes, high gloss hair, And strong jutting features.**

**I saw none of that the moment I met him.**

**Just a bone thin corpse boy.**

**But thankfully not a monster.**

**"Martin Aggersion Damien Harett at your obligation" he said to me, his voice rusty from lack of use.**

**I was startled that he could even move, much less talk, I yelped.**

**He sprang out of his chair, hurrying towards me a frown plastered on his long face. His stained strait jacket wrapped his arms closely to his frame.**

**"I must offer my profuse apologies, I have no knowledge of what my mannerism occurred to offend you Madam."**

**I stumbled back as he advanced towards me with him spouting of like a seventy year old English teacher.**

**God what a dandy. He always was such a gentleman with his speech.**

**"Uuuummm errrrr I uhhhhhh" I responded intelligently.**

**Martin Aggersion Damien Harett paused and tilted his head in such a way that his brow cast his eyes in shadow. The effect was startling, as if he had no eyes.**

**"Do you by chance, speak any English?"**

**Think spooky Dracula voice when he said this.**

**"Yes" I muttered**

**"Smashing, I haven't conversed with any sentient being for oh such a long age."**

**His head popped back straight and his eyes twinkled in the faint light. His smile large and seemed almost forced.**

**"Do you know any dialect of Gibberish or French? Both the same one way or another. Or what about Mandarin…No? I thought not. Cant even vocalize any style of Gibberish." He rapped his foot on the dusty wood floor.**

**French? I cant even speak Spanish and I'm half effing Mexican. What a Gringo, eh.**

**"Well all for the best in the end, I can't speak a lick of Chinese. Would have made for a wonderful banter though."**

**After the geyser of words erupted from him he relapsed into silence. His wide eyes staring intently on me cowering against the table. I could see the white rimmed around his irises**

**He shuffled closer to me.**

**"Say, would you be a gentle lady and help me shed this article of bondage. The last person put it on in such a confounding manner that I cant seem to get it off."**

**He said this so imploringly that all previous caution escaped me. A little boy I was reminded. A child like me. His face so sincere with wanting.**

**HA HA HA**

**What a fucking comedy that is my naivety.**

**"Okay" I ventured, further displaying my incredible linguistic ability.**

**The kitten was muttering some nonsense that I couldn't quite hear. I placed her carefully down on the rickety table. Didn't occur to me to question why I didn't understand her.**

**Martin uttered some happy laugh sounds as he jigged a bit on the spot.**

**He always would make odd little sounds to express his mood. Snorting giggling, squealing and a whole army of resonances made up a second langue for him.**

**It me a while to fuss with his strait jacket. It was made with an off white cream colored canvas. Really quite beautiful grey stitching swirled decoratively into gothic hearts and swirls. The rings that held the boys arms close to him were made of a gold like metal. I wasn't sure. For all I know it was gold.**

**To me it seemed extravagant to make a strait jacket so handsome. You put lunatics into strait jackets. To retain them from hurting themselves or anybody else. I mean…..**

**Wait**

**To restrain.**

**Lunatics.**

**Oooh oh oh**

**The implications of freeing Martin from his Strait jacket caught up with me the moment he wiggled out of my grasp.**

**Well he was still wearing the thing. It's just that his arms were now unbound. He danced around me laughing hysterically.**

**"My greatest thanks, thank you Thank yooooouuu my kind lady." he sang as he twirled around, impersonating a ballerina. The long sleeves of the strait jackets whipped around humorously.**

**He caught me up into some ballroom brigade, dragging me across the church. Singing ditties on the spot. Praising me or commentary on my lack of clothing or general lack of hygiene, though not unkindly. I think.**

**He deposited me in a chair that immediately threaten to break and reclined against his own chair chortling and out of breathe.**

**"Ah ah aaah, Lets discover what Mr. Rabbit has designed for tonight's consumption" He sighed as he settled into his chair, clapping his hands excitably.**

**" You know I do think it's one of his wives again. He serves one of them up from time to time. When they displease them or eat their own children or simply because they won't fuck him."**

**He began humming a tune , twitching as if nervous.**

**I adjusted myself until I was sitting properly in the chair.**

**"Tea" He announced loudly, looking towards me as if I would comment.**

**"Wha-"**

**"Tea is what got me into this rather difficult situation" he interrupted. He looked very solemn, his haggard form sitting bolt upright and his face contorted to only the faintest of uneasy smiles. Like it hurt to smile.**

**"If you have not noticed I've been ostracized from society. Placed all the fucking way in the central location of nowhere. Bounded and watched for by Mr. Rabbit. I suppose this whole endeavor was charming for a time. But…"**

**Martin pursed his lips and tilted his head towards me.**

**"I've grown to loathe this place." he whispered.**

**He grabbed a rusty cleaver from on the table. He began to fiddle with it, twirling it on it's tip, throwing it up into the air and catching it.**

**"Do want to know I got so _crazy_? How I rotted apart till I was insane? Why they call me a _lunatic?" _Martins eyes grew very wide, his grin manic.**

**He took my brief moment of silence as a confirmation. Martin never lets you talk unless your quick and sharp. He was perfectly happy to keep the conversation rolling without any help from me. Eventually I learned though.**

**"I lost the time."**

**His grin completely gone by now.**

**"I lost the time and I was late to the Tea Party"**

**"Well" I ventured.**

**"That's not too bad." Oh, god. I saw his cheek flinch. What did I do? For a eerie moment he was perfectly still. A stoic statue, if you will. Only that muscle right next to his nose twitched uncontrollably that lifted his lip into a snarl.**

**Martin Shot up and slammed the cleaver into the table.**

**"I _lost_ the _time_, my dear. And I was late to a perpetual Tea Party." He growled.**

**"Mother was the hostess and she was most displease with me, to say the least. Mother was never pleased with me but this one took the cake." Martins Arms gestured wildly around as he illustrated his point.**

**"She then burned all of my headwear, all of my hats." He choked.**

**"She knew I was making them in secret. Consorting with the whores of haberdashery."**

**He moaned wretchedly as he slumped in his chair.**

**"I could see it in her eyes, Oh those eyes. Everyone's eyes. They knew, they _knew._ I tried my best, you must believe me, but once I took that first sip of tea, which was an excellent Asian blend by the way. Once I took that first sip I _snapped._"**

**He was bolt upright once again livid in every erratic movement.**

**"The rest you can say was history."**

**He sat there with labored breathing for seconds that lapsed into minutes.**

**"Your hair wants cutting".**


End file.
